Cool, Shanghai!!!!

I've always wanted to visit the PRC. I've had multiple visits to Japan since I was an exchange student in 1992, served a year in the US Army on the DMZ in Korea 96-97, and vacationed for a month in Taiwan in 2004. I remember the food being magnificent in Taiwan!

The short version: I am back in the good ole USA.

For those of you who guessed I was in PRC... good on you!

9 days... Beijing, and Shanghai mostly... a couple of smaller towns as well. I won't bore you with the 500 photographs I took... I encourage all of you to travel while you can. I know many that have told me that they would travel when they retired, and now that they are retired they find that their health, or their wallets are inadequate to achieve that goal.

With no shame whatsoever, I will endorse the outfit responsible for my tour.

Their website is Chinaspree.com. Check out the SPECIALS tab for pricing and dates.

The low price will astound you. :eek:

Airfare from and to the USA,

9 day tour of Beijing and Shanghai,

great side excursions ( at slight extra cost, I recommend them all ) ...

FOUR star hotels,

and at least half the meals are included,

the full time services of an English speaking guide,

and domestic airfare and bus transportation while in-country.

The only thing not included, is your Chinese Visa. It costs a salty $140 each... The tour service will obtain it for you for an additional $40 admin fee. (Recommended if you are not based in Washington DC like I am... I visited the Chinese Embassy personally to get our Visas.

If you have any questions about the trip, I will be glad to answer them. :thumbup:

John

Nice to hear you're back, I guess you had a very good time.

Sergio

Welcome Home!

Did you take any pictures of PRC soldiers??? I've heard some :rolleyes: stories about this...

And since I'm a bachelor...how do the girls look??? :evilgrin:

You both deserved a Second Honeymoon~~ Enjoy!~~

Rich
I did take a couple photos that included police and soldiers but I haven't dumped the photos from our camera yet. If they are in the frame when photographing other things there didn't seem to be a problem. But I was very careful not to even have my camera out if there were obvious signs that indicated no photos allowed.

In response to your other question, :rolleyes: I may be happily married (20 years now) but I am certainly not dead.

Since China is the most populated nation on earth, I can assure you that the number of smiling attractive faces you would encounter during a visit in China are too numerous to count. :D

John, I may be happily married (20 years now) but I am certainly not dead. Me too! I'm married and Ellie is happy!

John. Welcome back!

However, and most important, did you score any Lugers while you were there? :cheers:

All the Best,

Gunny John

I didn't see a single firearm the entire time I was in PRC. Not even on the soldiers or police. Most just carried a baton... When my brother was a policeman in a Philadelphia suburb back in the 1970's, his baton was made of oak. I used to laugh when he discussed the necessity to give someone a "wood" shampoo...

You probobly remember the days of 'Francis S. Lazarro' aka Mayor Rizzo. I went on a ride along with his troopers and was scared the whole time. He had an elite motorcycle gang. 'Philadelphia Highway Patrol'! Not a safe place for either side in 1980s~~Eric

I met Frank Rizzo once a very long time ago. He had a hard nosed reputation with the criminal element. When he visited a trouble spot, it was easy to tell which one was Frank... he carried a custom sawed-off double-barrel chrome plated shotgun with the stock cut off behind the pistol grip... and no one doubted that he would use it.

http://www.njgunforums.com/jtguns.jpg

John it was a different time! Gangster like Nicky Scarfa and crew roamed the streets~ Mayor Rizzo ruled the city!! http://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/17/ob...d-villain.html

Rizzo, Scarfa, I'm not that sure about Lazarro, they all sound like Italian surnames!

I'm sorry they are somehow associated with gangster sort of people.
Sometimes seems that really we have only exported bandits in the States!
What a shame!

They all had their start in Sicily becoming 5 familys in NY. Capone in Chicago as new familys spread out. Eventually a new and novel federal law was passed R.I.C.O act making bosses responsible for underlying crime ie murder if they shared in any at all profits for the crime. Federal agents like Donnie Brasco were plants. The movie Goodfellas and of course the Godfather opened our eyes to only part of the actual extent! The full extent of the corruption of the monster that seemed to invade every aspect of our society. John Gotti was the beginning of their end but only that chapter! So they say! Very naive as others would rise to fill any void! Every nationality seems to have their criminal association or group. America has more now then ever! Greed Kills~~

luger.parabellum, I've read that once Nazi Germany moved into Italy proper, the SD investigated some crime families and sent the SS and Gestapo to deal with them, ruthlessly. Either being summarily shot or sent to a camp.

I suppose brute force is one way of eliminating crime unto extinction.

For the OP's topic, my parents have been to China and they enjoyed it. My father noticed they were not allowed to see certain areas when he would veer off, and they would only let him veer off so far.

The Mafia in south Italy survived. Lucky Luciano helped our forces in sothern Italy providing intelligence, disruption and sabatoge! It is believed he was responsible for the sinking of our troop ship the Normady while docked. He agreed to protect our shipping from future destruction. For his service he was released from prison and returned to Sicily! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdCXDkF0LfA and their help~~http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2LiJtuNXA0

[QUOTE=stressed;250646]luger.parabellum, I've read that once Nazi Germany moved into Italy proper, the SD investigated some crime families and sent the SS and Gestapo to deal with them, ruthlessly. Either being summarily shot or sent to a camp.

I suppose brute force is one way of eliminating crime unto extinction.

I agree with you, that's probably would be the better way to deal with some sort of criminals. Unfortumately they're often involved in the State apparatus...

They crime famillys were our ally at the time! Look what they did to Mussulini and his wife!

Yes I agree especially in the South of Italy, but surely not because they loved freedom.

In the Centre and here in the North of Italy there was a strong net of Partisans organized by the Commmunists with the help of the USSR of which they represented the longa manus.
In fact at the time they were really working for joining this country to the communist block.

Mussolini and his lover (not his wife) were captured on the 27th April 1945 while they were trying to escape mixed among 200 German soldiers of a convoy of 38 german lorries of the FlaK directed towards Austria.
They were shot by the Partisans the day after.

Back on topic:

Here you go Rich... (Photos 1 through 6 were taken in Tiananmen Square. The last two photos were taken on top of the Great Wall, near the town of Badaling. Notice the empty holsters on the right side of their belts. The young man dressed in black coat/hat and boots next to them was described as an "assistant", but I think he is probably a protégé in training to be uniform.)

Man oh man, just looking at those photos of you in Beijing made me want to cough! I thought the air quality in Osaka in 1992 was bad, but that was nothing compared to that nasty soup y'all were breathing over there.

I bet NOVA/DC, awful as it is (been there too many times, and used to live in Richmond) seems pristine compared to Manchuria during the Winter!!

ETA: Fascinating photos, nevertheless! Visiting Beijing and the Forbidden City/Tiananmen Square is on my 'bucket list', for sure!

I must recommend Taiwan, the night markets in Taipei offer a nearly unparalleled shopping experience, and the food is out of this world!! That and it's hard to beat sub-tropical weather in February!

Perfect~~~

The frangance of SULFUR permeated Beijing. Shanghai, not so much.

Pollution is apparent in Beijing as there is not much wind in the city. Much of the heating is done by coal. The situation was exacerbated by the fact that China had just celebrated their new year a couple weeks before our arrival, and just before our arrival was the Fireworks festival that accompanies their new year. The fireworks festival is probably the largest use of fireworks in the world. The smoke lingered in the city during our stay because there was no wind to wash it away.

Here is a perfect photo example. The cold damp air in the morning makes a lot of fog... and when you add the pollution to it, it looked like Photo #1 out our hotel room window at 9AM in the morning on the first day in-country.

This is a very unusual for a combination office building and hotel. The second photo was taken 3 days later in the afternoon. Notice the dramatic difference in the fog/smoke level.

We had surgical masks with us, and many locals wore them, some very decorative, but my wife and I didn't feel the need, and neither did our native english speaking guide.

How was the air in the rest of the country you visited? Did they have a Mcdonalds or Starbucks? Where and what were your best meal?

The air quality was much better everywhere except Beijing... I thought Shanghai was fine. All our breakfasts were full Western buffets with all the trimmings... they were easily the best meal of the day to sustain our energy.

Local Meal Quality varied for the meals outside of our hotels. There is very little meat in their diet, but all was edible. The strangest thing is the way they cut their meat. For example, a chicken leg would be cut laterally several times so that each bit contained a piece of the bone. (Someone needs to teach them how to de-bone their meats).

The best meal? in the very expensive underground international mall below our hotel in Beijing, there was a FatBurger franchise. After 3 days in Beijing, it was a delicious taste of home. A large single burger with the trimmings was about $8.00. I don't remember how much the accompanying chocolate milkshake was, but it was delicious!

In answer to your other question about fast food availability, Starbucks, KFC, and Burger King, Subway, and McDonalds were all represented... You can see that a 6 inch tuna sub at Subway was 25 Yuan... There were approximately 600 Yuan to the dollar. Here are the only photos I managed to take as we passed them. :cheers: :

Capitalism defeating Communism~ The old Chairman would have a fit!!!

It never failed to amaze me how delicious a Big Mac could be overseas once I tired of the native fare.... For example, I loved the week I spent in Copenhagen, Denmark, but the local food smelled awful. Thank goodness for the Turkish buffet, the pizza buffet restaurant, and the McDonald's in Copenhagen. 'Twas never afraid to sample a lot of the native beer, no matter where I went!

It never failed to amuse, the sameness, yet differences in McDonald's throughout the world. France "Royale with Cheese", beer at German McD.'s, Teriyaki burger and beef curry rice at McD.'s in Japan...

Because we left Shanghai on the last day earlier than the hotel started serving breakfast, we grabbed breakfast at the McDonalds at the airport. It was truely a taste of home, and very reasonable. I had a sausage/cheese muffin, and a medium coffee, normally at least $2.00+ in the USA. At the airport, it was 48 Yuan. (again, there were 600 Yuan to the dollar).

The world has definitly shrunk! For the better? or For the worse? I'm sure the better! If it has a MacDonalds its probobly safe! The mid east maybe not~~